This Is My Land… Hebron (UK premiere, 30th & 31st March)

Hebron is the largest city in the occupied West Bank, home to 160,000 Palestinians. It is also home to one of the first Israeli settlements in the West Bank and the only one right in the heart of a Palestinian city. Once a bustling hub of activity, the city centre now resembles a ghost town. A colony of 600 Israeli settlers lives in the city centre, requiring a garrison of more than 2,000 Israeli soldiers to defend them. The cultural and economic life of the town is being suffocated. It’s a war between neighbours where the main goals are to conquer one more metre of the city, keep the enemy at bay, and simply stand one’s ground. Featuring interviews with both Israelis and Palestinians living in Hebron, as well as activists on both sides, members of the Israeli parliament and prominent Ha’aretz journalists, This Is My Land… Hebron lifts the lid on Hebron as it is today – a city fraught with violence and hate.

Q&A discussions with the filmmakers will take place at both screenings

Human Rights Watch has reported extensively on violations by Israel, the Palestinian Authority, and Palestinian armed groups like Hamas in Israel and the occupied Palestinian territories. We recently documented the two-tier system of laws and practices that Israel imposes in the West Bank, providing extensive support to Jewish settlers while imposing harsh conditions on Palestinians in areas under Israeli control, without any legitimate security rationale. In a recent report, Separate and Unequal, Human Rights Watch analysed severe discriminatory policies that in some cases have effectively forcibly displaced Palestinians from their homes. http://www.hrw.org/en/reports/2010/12/19/separate-and-unequal